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Sternly, remorselessly, fate guides each of us; only at the beginning, when we’re absorbed in details, in all sorts of nonsense, in ourselves, are we unaware of its harsh hand.

Ivan Turgenev

I was afraid of looking into my heart…afraid of thinking seriously about anything…I did not want to know whether I was loved, and I did not want to admit to myself that I was not loved.
IVAN TURGENEV

Admit Afraid Heart Love Myself
All human beings hang by a thread, an abyss may open under their feet at any moment, and yet they have to go and invent all sorts of difficulties for themselves and spoil their lives.
IVAN TURGENEV

Difficult Human Live Moments Open Spoil
Take what you can yourself, and don’t let others get you into their hands; to belong to oneself, that is the whole thing in life.
IVAN TURGENEV

Hands Independent Life Yourself
I’m through with Tolstoy. He has ceased to exist for me…. If I eat a bowl of soup and like it, I know by that fact alone and with absolute certainty that Tolstoy will find it bad, and vice versa.
IVAN TURGENEV

Alone Bad Existence Fact Myself
Circumstances define us; they force us onto one road or another, and then they punish us for it.
IVAN TURGENEV

Circumstance Force Punishment Road
Death is like a fisherman, who, having caught a fish in his net, leaves it in the water for a time; the fish continues to swim about, but all the while the net is round it, and the fisherman will snatch it out in his own good time.
IVAN TURGENEV

Death Goodness Leaving Time Water
Great God, grant that twice two be not four.
IVAN TURGENEV

God Greatness Mathematics
Even nightingales can’t be fed on fairy tales.
IVAN TURGENEV

Bird Fairy Tale Feed
Who among us has the strength to oppose petty egoism, those petty good feelings, pity and remorse?
IVAN TURGENEV

Ego Feeling Goodness Strength
There is a sweetness in being the sole source, the autocratic and irresponsible cause of the greatest joy and profoundest pain to another.
IVAN TURGENEV

Autocracy Greatness Pain Reason Source Sweet
We sit in the mud and reach for the stars.
IVAN TURGENEV

Reach Stars
Nature is not a temple, but a workshop, and man’s the workman in it.
IVAN TURGENEV

Man Nature Temple Workshop
Nothing is worse and more hurtful than a happiness that comes too late.
IVAN TURGENEV

Happiness Hurt Late Worst
A son is like a lopped off branch. As a falcon he comes when he wills and goes where he lists.
IVAN TURGENEV

Branch Himself Son Willing
I walked in the meadows of green grieving for my life.
IVAN TURGENEV

Grieve Life Meadow Myself Walk
I only know that I feel tired, antiquated; I feel as though I had been living a long, long time.
IVAN TURGENEV

Feeling Live Myself Time

Sternly, remorselessly, fate guides each of us; only at the beginning, when we’re absorbed in details, in all sorts of nonsense, in ourselves, are we unaware of its harsh hand.

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Sternly, remorselessly, fate guides each of us; only at the beginning, when we’re absorbed in details, in all sorts of nonsense, in ourselves, are we unaware of its harsh hand.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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